Maybe it's just me, but I found it funny that the name of the talk is "A Self-inflicted Purging".

I wondered what the blazes he meant by that?

The title is a bad one.

He's obviously trying to benefit from the title's undertones of self mortification in order to up the ante on the purging that needs to take place: not only ceasing from the sin, but perhaps a barbed wire wound tightly around a thigh? Purge the spiritual stain through physical pain?

I think the message from the Church is clear. Masturbation is like eating too much or drinking cola drinks. The Church says that these are bad habits that should be minimized or avoided.

But masturbation is not a worthiness issue. There is a reason that lessons and instructions to leaders are vague on the issue or omit it entirely.

The Church attitude toward masturbation is still pretty strict and old-fashioned. The secular world (with which I tend to agree) says masturbation is totally normal, natural, and probably even healthy/beneficial for people and other primates without access to a sex partner.

On an unrelated note, I'm a little disappointed that nobody suggested that you should have given the object lesson where you chewed up a stick of gum. That one is a classic.

The best lesson on the law of chastity for married men would be a viewing of Fatal Attraction. That movie makes me more determined to always be faithful than any Church lesson ever has.

I never had lessons on masturbation as a youth. Although it's not mentioned explicitly, I've had many lessons on it as an adult, and they are not aimed at people without sex partners (i.e. the MANY anti-porn lessons I have seen taught in RS--which are primarly taught as ways to see if your partner has a porn problem).